Mass Effect: The Difference
by siredmund
Summary: Of their own accord her feet began to shuffle forward, to the point where the one path parted into three. She had to pick one now. **Very rough, this story needs another pass, I will hopefully get to it in the near future. Neither the first nor last ME3 ending rewrite to which this site will bear witness, unless I've severely missed my guess.


_Author's Note: __I know I'm not alone in my dislike of the canonical ending to our epic trilogy. The forums are flooded with dissatisfied and, worse yet, distressed fans hoping against hope that what we received wasn't truly the end of our beloved series. Fortunately for me, the brilliant thing about imagination is that I can write my own end. So that's what this is; just an idle re-imagining based on absolutely no facts or evidence outside of my own head, so please take it with a grain of salt. Or large fruity drink.  
><em>

_Rated M because Shepard still has a potty-mouth._

* * *

><p><em>And both that morning equally lay<em>  
><em>In leaves no step had trodden black.<em>  
><em>Oh, I kept the first for another day!<em>  
><em>Yet knowing how way leads on to way,<em>  
><em>I doubted if I should ever come back.<em>

_- _Robert Frost_, The Road Not Taken_

* * *

><p>"<em>Wake up."<em>

Without bothering to consult her on the matter, her eyes obliged the command, flying open as she jerked compulsively towards the voice. The source was not immediately clear, as her field of view was somewhat limited by the surface to which her face was rather firmly pressed, but aside from the floor and whatever was emitting that damn light the area around her seemed to be rather devoid of notable landmarks. Unless the floor had spontaneously developed the power of speech and was celebrating this discovery by practicing on the only other being in sight, she was going to have to conclude that along with the irritating habit of shining harsh, blue, blinding light in her face, her tormenter could also include in what could only be a fascinating and extensive resume the ability form simple two-word sentences. The brightness sent white-hot pain lancing through her eyes to bury itself somewhere deep in the recesses of her skull. _Fuck me..._ She shied away from it, turning her face from the offending intensity. Her cheek met metal as it settled back to the ground, the surface cool and inviting. Unable to see past the persistent afterimage, she let her eyes drift closed once more, incapable of mustering even a concern for the very real possibility that she may have just been struck permanently blind.

She lay there for a time, concentrating on the simple action of pulling air into her battered lungs and letting it escape once more. The movement hurt, but in a good, life-affirming, at-least-I-still-_can_ sort of way. The rest of her injuries were less forgiving and she noted and categorized each grievance with due diligence. Her limbs sounded off in quick succession, all present and accounted for and seemingly unbroken. Legs: check. Arms: check. Spine: check. Skull: check, protests acknowledged. The pain her ribs suggested fracture, probably multiple after being tossed around like a sack of flour, but relatively low on the priority list. The tell-tale deadened sensation of third degree burns across the skin of her exposed arms was some cause for concern, however. She also recalled leaving behind a not insubstantial amount of blood in that other chamber, but presumably her return to consciousness and the since-slowed egress from the wound in her side meant she had a small window of time before that matter would need to be addressed. All in all, she had probably suffered worse. She was having a hard time coming up with a specific example, but she was certain there was one to be found somewhere.

Finally the spots faded from the back of her eyelids and she attempted once more to open them, this time with more caution. Cracking open first one, then the other when the route proved safe, she was able to see now what the brilliance had masked before. The sight that greeted her was far from welcome; stretched in the air above her raged a battle the likes of which she could never have dreamed, confirming her fear that she was in fact awake. Ships skated across the sky, trading fire like insults, the resulting blasts filling the dark expanse of space until the sheer quantity illuminated the scene as though it were midday. As she watched as a beam arced out from a massive Reaper Destroyer, carving a glowing swath through a line of cruisers that may as well have been made of paper for all the protection their metal hulls provided. Around them others drifted aimlessly in the sky like limp corpses, cloaked in shrapnel and leaking fuel and atmosphere like precious bodily fluids as their live brethren raced past, each trapped in its own personal skirmish. From her limited vantage point she couldn't tell who was winning, but she could guess.

And behind it all was Earth. Her Earth. That realization alone was enough to get her moving, hands levering beneath her and pushing her up onto reluctant knees. She hazarded a glance to the source of light. During her preoccupation it had resolved itself into a familiar form, and somehow she found herself unsurprised. Of course.

The small boy knelt before her, hands on his knees and waiting patiently, if a holograph could be described as being patient. He mirrored her movements as she struggled to her feet, but with considerably more grace, regarding her solemnly from a height just above her waist. She squinted down at him uncertainly.

"What..." she rasped as her tongue fought to form words. "Where am I?"

"_The Citadel." _The voice rippled and echoed through the air around them, amplified and reverberated by unseen walls. _"It's my home."_

The banality of his tone sent the answer barreling straight past her common-sense filter to plow headlong into acceptance. Well of course. Where else would she be? She contemplated that for a moment, eyes following the silent war being fought around them. The gravity of the situation seemed a distant memory even as she watched with her own eyes the quiet death of thousands, heralding the screaming deaths of trillions. It meant nothing to her. _This must be what going mad feels like. _Her gaze finally settled on the holograph, its child-like face decidedly unchild-like in its stillness and severity. She found herself asking the question that had perhaps the least to do with her current situation.

"Who are you?"

"_I am the Catalyst."_

Oh. But wait... "I thought the Citadel was the Catalyst."

"_No." _His tone left no room for argument._ "The Citadel is part of me." _

_I guess that makes sense. I think. _She pressed a hand to her temple as her head began to throb. This was getting her nowhere, so she decided to cut straight to the chase. "I need to stop the Reapers. Do you know how I can do that?"

"_Perhaps," _the child said evasively. _"I control the Reapers. They are my solution." _He turned and moved away, towards a pillar of light joining the floor beneath her to the looming structure above. With a start she recognized the Crucible, hanging in space overhead as if it belonged there. As if it had always been there. It _had_ always been there, hadn't it?

"Solution?" She followed him down the long stretch of decking, struggling both literally and metaphorically to keep up. The pain from her injuries dulled to a mild ache as she lengthened her stride to match his. "To what?" The blood rushing in her ears nearly drowned out his response.

"_Chaos. The created will always rebel against their creators. But we found a way to stop that from happening. A way to restore order for the next cycle." _It was a statement, as if they were talking of proven facts.

"By wiping out organic life?" Clearly she was missing something.

"_No," _he said patently, as if explaining something to a small child. _"We harvest advanced civilizations, leaving the younger ones alone. Just as we left your people alive the last time we were here."_

"But you killed the rest?" Had she meant for that to be a question?

"_We helped them ascend so they could make way for new life, storing the old life in Reaper form."_

"I think we'd rather keep our own form." She couldn't help but match his mild tone.

"_No. You can't. Without us to stop it, synthetics will destroy all organics. We've created the cycle so that never happens. That's the solution."_

_No, this must be what going mad feels like. I think that sort of made sense. In obtuse, artificial machine logic. _She shook her head. It was still _fucked up. _"But you're taking away our future," she said, as much to convince herself as him. "Without a future we have no hope. Without hope, we might as well be machines, programed to do what we're told."

"_You have hope. More than you think. The fact that you are standing here, the first organic ever, proves it. But it also proves my solution won't work any more."_

"So now what?"

"_We find a new solution."_

_You're damn straight we do, _she tried to say. What came out was, "Yeah. But how?"

"_The Crucible changed me, created new possibilities. But I can't make them happen. I know you've thought about destroying us." _He gaze fell on a nearby power conduit, bathed in red light.

Unbidden an image rose in her mind, one of Anderson. He strode across the gangway, pistol drawn. As he approached the conduit he fired into it, the bullet shattering the protective shield and piercing the core. Fire blossomed out, engulfing him and jolting her back to the present. Her vision swam and she stumbled. _What the fuck?_

The child was speaking again._ "You can wipe out all synthetic life if you want. Even you are partly synthetic."_

"But the Reapers will be destroyed?" she asked, latching onto that very important fact.

"_Yes. But the peace won't last. Soon your children will create synthetics and then the chaos will come back."_

"Maybe."

"_Or, do you think you can control us?" _He turned to the other side of the decking to where an open panel sat, blue light glinting off its surface.

This time she was ready as another vision invaded her mind. This one was of the Illusive Man approaching the blue panel. Lightning arced from the console as he grasped the exposed channel, consuming him in a flare of light.

As her sense returned she couldn't help but let slip a mirthless chuckle. "Heh. So the Illusive Man was right after all." Not surprisingly, that thought brought her no comfort at all.

"_Yes. But he could never have taken control because we already controlled him."_

"But I can?"

"_You will die. You will control us but you will lose everything you have."_

"But the Reapers will obey me?"

"_Yes." _He paused in thought. She wasn't entirely sure she liked the speculative look he gave her. _"There is another solution."_

"Yeah?"

"_Synthesis."_ He gestured to the beam that connected the Citadel to the Crucible.

"And that is?"

"_Add your energy to the Crucible's. Everything you are will be absorbed and then sent out. The chain reaction will combine all synthetic and organic life into a new framework. A new DNA." _There was that machine logic again. Compile all the data into one file-type.

"I... don't know." It was getting harder and harder to concentrate.

"_Why not? Synthetics are already a part of you. Can you imagine your life without them?"_

"And there will be peace?" It seemed too simple.

"_The cycle will end. Synthesis is the final evolution of life. But we need each other to make it happen. You have a difficult decision. Releasing the energy of the Crucible will end the cycle, but it will also destroy the mass relays. The paths are open, but you have to choose."_

"That's..." Her gaze drifted across the choices offered. The blue light of the panel to her left shimmered over the open ports, mimicking the light of holograph before her. _Makes sense. Control the blue light, control the Reapers, _her dazed mind reasoned. She wondered with detached fascination at its presence. Why would they have that convenient station... Her thoughts skirted away from the concept and her eyes sought purchase to the right. A humming filled her head as they fell upon the power conduit. In her mind's eye she could still see the red glow of the explosion, searing light akin to that of the Reaper's destructive beam. Of course. Red means destroy. _Conveniently color-coded... _This thought, too, slithered from her mental grasp. And then there was the beam from the Crucible. Or was it from the Catalyst? Suddenly it was very important that she know. Vital that she know. That green light. Where did it originate? Or did it come from both? Had it always been there?

"That's..." She couldn't think. The humming grew in pitch and of their own accord her feet began to shuffle forward, to the point where the one path parted into three. _Three roads diverged in a red wood... _

No...

That wasn't it. Blue. A blue wood...

No, woods weren't blue. Woods were green. Diverged in a green...

No. No, that was wrong, too.

_And sorry I could not travel both..._

Her eyes drifted up to where the Earth hovered in the sky above them. The surface was dark, save for where it had been set alight by the fires from the Reapers' attacks. _And both that morning equally lay in leaves no step had trodden black. _Black. Black was a color. She remembered black. What did black mean? Confused, she looked down once more and saw that she had come to the intersection. She had to pick one now. Destroy, synthesize, or control. One, two, or three. Red, green, or blue. _Three roads diverged in a... wood... in a... a..._

Yellow.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood.

With a crash reality slammed back into focus, the abrupt change striking her like a physical blow. With sudden clarity she saw the scene before her, the battle waging above and the routes to the solution below. The colors were gone, the illumination purely of a mundane variety and no longer some perverse insight into the consequence of each choice. She shook her head, clearing it of the last vestiges of haze and looked for the first time into the face of the child. In it she saw an eagerness he had managed to conceal until now, a cunning masked by a facade of innocence and childish certainty that had lead her into taking everything he said as fact. She'd played right into his hand. This was what he wanted. He wanted her to choose one of those three options. They seemed so different, but were they?

Operating under the assumption that her vision was true, if she tried to control the Reapers, she would become just like them. She'd seen the Illusive Man as he turned into a creature just like the husks. The child had said she would be able to control them, but even assuming that was true, once she had turned into a Reaper who was to say that her goals would remain the same as they were now? Maybe then she would _want_ to destroy all organic life. This was assuming she could in fact control them, and that was the biggest 'if' of all. No. She couldn't risk it. She wouldn't.

And if she tried to synthesize organics and synthetics, wouldn't she just be accomplishing what the Reapers were trying to do when they harvested organic life? Wouldn't it just make everything like them? Logical, synthetic, homogenized life? And the destruction of the relays... Even if it didn't result in an explosion that wiped the entire system in which each was housed out of existence, that would mean the death of the galactic civilization as a whole. And what was worse, she had just brought all the fleets of the galaxy here. They would all be trapped in the Sol system. Earth could barely feed its current population, never mind that of her armada. And what of the quarians and the turians? Their dextro-amino systems wouldn't be able to handle any food grown here. Both species would starve. And this generation of krogans would be the last, without any females to bare new children. Synthesis was horrific in its implication. Not an option.

But what about destroy? That's what she was here for, wasn't it? But why would he even offer that choice if it mean his own destruction? He said it wouldn't end the cycle. Was he lying? She supposed if they were given enough time organics would rediscover artificial intelligence. They already knew it was possible. That would reset this whole mess, assuming that the created would always rebel. They only had to look at the geth to see how that ended. But she had seen the beginning of that war. The quarians were as much to blame as the geth, and individuals on both sides had tried to avoid the conflict. Besides, could she really wipe out all of the geth now? Now that they were finally at peace with the quarians? Now that they had finally achieved individuality? Wouldn't the lack of synthetic life in the galaxy mean that organics would never learn to live side by side with the artificial? They would have to start all over again, learn the same lessons all over again. Doomed to repeat this awful cycle. And then there was EDI. EDI, who had only recently found he true self. Her life was in its infancy. Could she really sacrifice them all, murder them all, on the hope that this whole mess wouldn't happen again? That it wouldn't just reset the cycle? In fifty thousand years they could be right back here where they started. The cast would change but the script would be the same.

She looked around her, casting about for another option. But there wasn't anything else. Just her, this bizarre god-child-AI-thing, and the paths before her. Three paths, three options, but all lead back to the same result. Synthetic life consuming organic. The illusion of choice.

No. There had to be another way. This ended right here, right now. She found her gaze on her feet once more, and the walkway beneath them. Beyond the decking was nothing, empty space falling back towards the Citadel proper. Empty space and the three paths forward.

And one path back.

Oh.

Her head snapped up, eyes darting to the holograph. He seemed to realize something had changed as she met his gaze. He took a step towards her. _"The paths are open, but you have to choose," _he repeated.

"That's bullshit," she said flatly, matching his movement forward with her own step backwards.

"_What?" _He paused in his advance, confusion and uncertainty warring across the planes of his face.

"You heard me. Your choices are bullshit. I'll find another way, thanks." She turned on her heel and began limping back the way she'd come.

"_Where are you going?" _he demanded.

She didn't answer as she increased her pace. Each jarring step sent fire shooting through her entire frame as the injuries that had before been suspiciously silent began once more to file formal complaints, but she didn't dare stop. Behind her the AI called after her, his voice growing louder and louder until his shrieks rang in her ears and filled her head. She clamped both hands to her ears and began to run. Beneath her feet the walkway began to quake, convulsing and shaking until the supports began to sag. She fell to her knees, scrambling on all fours towards the lift as the floor tried its damnedest to pitch her off. She was almost there.

As if in response to that thought the lift began descending back into the ground without her. She dove forward as it dropped from view, falling through the vacated space and hitting the platform with a painful thud. Above her the portal slammed shut, cutting off the sight of the god-child, but not the sound or the tremors of his wrath. Reaching the floor below, it was all she could do to keep her balance as she staggered for the chamber doorway. Before her Anderson's limp form slid across the roiling surface like a broken doll. Her eyes burned as she turned away. She couldn't help him now.

"_-mander. Commander Shepard. Do you read?" _Hackett's voice rang in her ears as the comm crackled to life.

"Admiral!" She cupped her hand to her ear, straining to hear him over the din. "Sir, can you hear me?"

"_What the hell is happening up there, Shepard? The Citadel is going haywire. Did you activate Catalyst?"_

"No," she panted, pivoting out of the path of a falling panel at the last moment before it slammed into the ground. Beneath her feet the platform bucked ominously, sending her stumbling. "The Catalyst is the one that created the Reapers. We have to destroy it. Have-" Another panel struck the platform and the whole surface began listing to the right. She fell to her knees and slid a few heart-stopping feet towards the yawning pit below before she managed to hook her fingers around a loose tile, slowing her decent. This was getting out of hand. "Have what's left of the fleet focus its fire on the Citadel Tower!"

"_What about the Crucible? We may be destroying our only hope of using it."_

"The Crucible's a trap." Clinging to the platform, she slowly inched her way forward hand over hand. The door wasn't more than a few meters away, but at her current pace the distance might as well have been ten times that. "The Citadel – houses a massive AI - that controls the Reapers," she huffed. "If we – destroy the Citadel, we may – be able to destroy what's controlling – _shit._" The catwalk completed its ninety-degree rotation with a jerk, its surface ending up completely perpendicular to its original orientation. Ok, this was ridiculous. _Why didn't this thing have railings? s_he wondered as she lunged for a better handhold. This time she managed to catch the side of the platform, legs dangling uselessly over the chasm.

"_Shepard, are you sure about this?" _

"No." She swung herself forward and caught a new grip, scooting laboriously along the catwalk. "But it's – the best chance we have." The numbness from her arms spread up to her fingers, making them feel clumsy and thick. As she shifted forward again her reaching hand slipped from the edge and she swung out over the abyss, arm flailing wildly before her fingers found purchase once again. She clung to the surface, shaking like a leaf as she regained control of her breathing. _Fuck me._

"_Alright Commander, I'll relay the order. I can buy you some time, but you need to move."_

"Acknowledged." A last surge forward and her hand grasped the edge of the doorway. Trembling with effort and relief, she hauled herself up onto the ledge, sprawling out on the decking face first. Her relief was short-lived, however, as she raised her head to look out over the gaping empty space where the old walkway used to be. She pulled herself up into a sitting position in the doorway and hazarded a glance back the way she had come. She was just in time to see the platform shudder a final time, then slide away from its supports in the wall and tumble down into the depths below. She sighed. _I hate __everything._

"_Commander," _Hackett piped up, interrupting her musings. _"The Reapers are already converging on the Citadel. Whatever you've done has pissed them off. You need to get out of there. Now."_

"Sure thing Admiral," she replied, closing her eyes and resting her head against the cool metal of the door frame. "I'm on my way."

Seconds ticked by in relative silence as the Citadel shook itself apart around her. The god-child did not appear again, though evidence of his displeasure rained from the ceiling each time the structure shook. Or had the attack already started? Oh well, it didn't matter. If this didn't work they were all humped anyway. And she was fresh out of bright ideas.

"_Shepard, we're out of time. Are you clear?"_

She opened her eyes and looked back into the chamber. The remaining panels continued to work themselves free of the ceiling as the room slowly crumbled. Through the viewports she could see the Reapers, their giant hulking shapes closing in around the Citadel.

"Yeah," she sighed. "Yeah, I'm clear. Open fire."

"_Understood, Commander."_

"_Belay that order, Admiral,"_ a voice cut in over the comm._ "The extraction team is going to need another five minutes."_

"_You have two, Lieutenant."_

"Understood, sir." The new voice came from somewhere above her left shoulder. From an open ventilation shaft three meters up, were one to insist on being precise. Craning her neck around to see she was greeted with what was easily the most welcome sight she had ever seen. Today, anyway. In the past hour. Definitely the past fifteen minutes. She felt the beginnings of a dopey smile spread across her face and for once was disinclined to resist it.

"You're late, Major."

* * *

><p>Epilogue<p>

Location: unknown

Though the local airborne life-forms could hardly be described as 'avian' by any stretch of the imagination, their squawking calls were reminiscent of the sea gulls back on Earth. Or at least what she fancied sea gulls might sound like, having never personally encountered one before. But still, she liked to think the sound bore some similarity. The noise of the lapping tide, however, was just right.

She sighed, bringing the emergency induction port to her lips and taking a satisfying pull. The cool liquid tasted nothing like the name "Volisian Gin" suggested, but in her experience that could be said for all inebriants, not just those of the alien persuasion. It was thick and syrupy and tasted like blue. And it got the job done. Beside her her companion mirrored her movement, raising his violently pink concoction to his mandibled mouth. It smelled absolutely foul, but he seemed to be enjoying it.

They sat in companionable silence, letting the soft red sunlight warm their exposed skin and drinking in the tangy sent of the coppery sea. Far in the distance the sun winked off the slick surface of a massive metal corpse, sprouting up out of the surf like a mammoth shark fin.

"Shepard," came a voice across the pebbled shore. "We need to leave now if we're going to make that reconstruction summit."

She squinted into the sun at the silhouette as he approached her tactically selected position. "That's not until Tuesday."

The darkened shape ran an exasperated hand through his hair. "It _is _Tuesday." He held out the hand to her, in parody of a gesture he'd extended to her once before. And as before, the action meant it was time to get back to work.

She shot her seated cohort a conspiratory grin, stretching languidly before taking the proffered hand and rising to her feet. She brushed the sand from her armor and retrieved her Widow from its resting place beside her drink, securing it to the waiting port on her back.

"Typical. No rest for the wicked."


End file.
